Think – and act – for yourselves

 The cult of leadership is essential for the preservation of capitalism. "Bad leadership" is a convenient excuse that something other than capitalism caused a government's failure to deliver, or a reform that doesn't meet expectations. And always there are new leaders, promising the never-never land.

 The market and other forces of the system are uncontrollable by any government; political leaders can't stop depressions, wars or the arms race. All they can do is try to run the system in the interests of their masters, the dominant class. And in the process, betray their naive and trusting followers.

 Faith in leaders presents a bizarre contradiction between the fact that the masses who have the brains and the ability to produce everything and run this system from top to bottom as they are now doing (indicating that the common people really have the ability to bring in a sane system and accomplish everything necessary for its success.) versus the myth that these people require "great men" to tell them what to do.

 The majority are capable of informing themselves and taking the necessary political action to establish common (not state) ownership and democratic control of the means for distributing wealth, by and in the interest of society as a whole. Every individual will then stand in equal relationship to the means of production. There will be no more use for the coercive state because division into classes of rulers and ruled will be ended. It will be replaced by social administration, predominantly local, but involving regional and global administration also. A war-less, wage-less, money-less system of conscious, voluntary co-operation and free access according to individually and democratically determined requirements.

 The removal of the present artificial restrictions on production and the elimination of capitalism's waste, combined with global materials and energy of which there is no real shortage, will make an abundant, harmonious and meaningful life for all.

 We can have all this and more. On the other hand we, as wage slaves, can continue to offer ourselves as commodities on the world market, along with sugar, soap, finger bowls and hydrogen bombs. We can go through life with price tags around our necks, looking for the highest bidder. We can obey orders – be treated like children.

 The system cannot be humanized or controlled. Even the owning class is endangered by potential nuclear holocaust and destruction of the ecosystem source of all life. This is not an emotional appeal. It is simply pointing to the facts. Considering the gravity of the situation, can you afford to dismiss our rational analysis without first thoroughly investigating it ?

(from a Socialist Party of Canada leaflet)